Not All Change is Bad
by iheartvesper
Summary: How will Booth and Brennan react when they are faced with a fundamental change in their partnership?
1. Chapter 1

**So, a new story from me. If anyone's intrigued by the first chapter, I'll post more. If not, I'll be sad, but I'll live... Hee. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own the characters.**

_I'm terminating your partnership._

The words repeated themselves in Brennan's head as she shrugged off her jacket and threw it furiously onto the floor of her living room. The buttons of the jacket made a resounding clank when they hit the hardwood floor. Brennan wiped her hand over her face and started pacing back and forth in the room. There was a million thoughts going on inside her head, all going on a very high speed. She could feel the headache forming. Massaging her temples, she flopped down onto the couch and leaned her head back. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't stop her mind going through what had happened earlier.

"_What is this meeting about?" she asked her partner as she got in the elevator and pushed the button._

"_For the gazillionth time, I don't know," Booth replied impatiently and followed her to the elevator. "Cullen didn't give any details."_

"_Do you think he's going to reprimand us for something?"_

"_Nah. I don't think we've even done anything questionable lately."_

"_True." Brennan stepped back to let more people in to the elevator. "Maybe he's finally releasing us from therapy sessions with Sweets."_

"_Yeah, like that's going to happen. Maybe he just has a new case for us. Something high-profile." _

_Finally the elevator doors opened at the eighth floor and they got out. They walked down the hall and when they reached Cullen's door, Booth started adjusting his tie._

"_Whatever it is, try not to piss him off, Bones. He really doesn't like you."_

"_Well maybe he shouldn't 'get pissed' so easily."_

_Booth chuckled at Brennan's use of air quotes while still fidgetting with his tie. "Just try not to be so blunt with him. In fact, why don't you let me handle the talking."_

_Brennan swatted his hands away from the tie and adjusted it properly. "That is offensive. I'm not going to sit quietly in the corner like some shy five-year-old." _

"_Fine. Just trying to help, but never mind." Booth knocked on the door and heard the man inside tell them to come in. _

_They entered the office and sat on the chairs that were in front of Cullen's desk. Cullen himself sat behind the neat desk, wearing a slightly amused expression._

"_That door is not soundproof, you know."_

_The partners glanced at each other. Booth's eyes widened a little, and he was about to give an explanation when Cullen interrupted him._

"_That's okay, agent Booth, no need to explain. What I'd like to do is get straight to the reason why I called you two here."_

"_Please do," Brennan said while Booth just nodded. Cullen's face turned serious, maybe even a little sad._

"_I've had a few meetings with my superiors this week. The point in these meetings was to evaluate my work as a director of this department. I won't bore you with the details, but overall they thought that my work here has been first-rate. Except for one thing." He took a deep breath. "They were not happy with the fact that I have let a person who doesn't work in the FBI go to the field with an agent."_

_Brennan frowned. "They meant me? But I have gone to the field willingly. And I have signed the form that releases the FBI from any accountability in case of injury or death."_

"_Yes, I'm aware of that. And they are too. But they aren't comfortable with the idea that an inexperienced person is accompanying an agent to the crime scenes and interrogations."_

_Booth and Brennan were staring at Cullen intently, both anxiously anticipating what he was going to say next._

"_As you're surely aware, I have to take orders too. In this case I have no other option than to obey them, as reluctant as I am."_

_Cullen glanced out of his window and continued with a grave voice._

"_I'm terminating your partnership."_


	2. Chapter 2

**Here is the next chapter of this story. Give it a read and review if you feel like it was worth it. A million thanks to everyone who reviewed and/or alerted the first chapter! I love feedback. :)**

Booth sat on the bar stool, leaning on the counter. He was tracing lines to the condensation of his pint of Guinness and half-listening to the conversation two strangers were having next to him. It was a stupid and trivial conversation, he thought, but he listened anyway. He needed something to distract him from his own thoughts. But after the two middle-aged women had discussed their views on menopause and finished their cosmopolitans, they left. Booth rubbed his hand over his face and started thinking about his partner who had stormed out of Cullen's office after the shocking revelation. He had stayed and tried to explain to Cullen that the decision to end their partnership was very much counterproductive. Unfortunately, this had been all for nothing since his boss had no say in the matter. After realizing that there was nothing he could do, Booth had left the Hoover building and driven straight to the bar where he was now sitting.

Booth knew that he should've gone to find Brennan and calm her down. But truth be told, he hadn't really felt like doing that. He knew that she should be left alone for a while, to give her time to vent her anger and finally calm down. Also, he didn't think that he would be much of a help for her anyway, since he himself wasn't in such a great mood either. But now that he had spent an hour at the dusky bar, he felt willing to go see her. He paid for the beer and calmly made his way to the car.

20 minutes later he was knocking on her door. He waited, hands in his pockets, for her to check the peephole and open the door. At least he _hoped_ she would let him in. Who knew, maybe she was mad at him. But before Booth could think that further, the door opened. She was standing there, in her sweatpants and her face scrubbed clean from makeup.

"Hey," he said tentatively.

"Hey," she responded, gesturing him to come in. He stepped in and closed the door. They stood facing each other, neither knowing what to say or how to react to the situation. Booth was the one to break the silence.

"So," he started, "how has your evening been?"

She recognized the attempt to cheer her up with a stupid joke and smiled slightly. "Not that great." She paused. "How about yours?"

Booth just shook his head. "I can't believe they did that to us."

"Yeah." Brennan sighed and walked to the living room. She sat on the couch and Booth joined her.

"You know I had nothing to do with it, right?" he asked, leaning his forearms on his knees.

Her head snapped towards him. "Of course," she answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "The decision was obviously made by someone from a higher position, someone who believes he can just bark orders at people without actually knowing anything about the situation," she ranted. "And someone who is very stupid," she added quietly. Booth chuckled at her use of such a common word.

"So, you're upset about this?"

"Aren't you?"

"I asked you first."

Brennan rose from the couch and started pacing yet again. "Yes, I am upset! I mean, we've been partners for three years and they have never before had any problem with me going to the field with you. Our work has been efficient and successful. Why would they want to break us up? Are they _insane_?"

"I don't know," Booth responded quietly. Brennan stopped pacing, cheeks flushed from frustration and maybe also desperation.

"Want to get out of here?" he asked. "I don't know about you but I could definitely use some fresh air right now."

Brennan pondered for a while. "Sounds good." She picked up her discarded jacket from the floor and slipped it on. It didn't really go with the sweatpants she was wearing but she didn't have the energy to care right now.

Once they were outside, she inquired him about where they were going. Booth just shrugged and started walking down the sidewalk. Brennan followed closely behind, wondering why he was so quiet. Was he mad at her?

When they had walked a couple of blocks, Brennan couldn't stand the silence anymore.

"Booth?"

"Yeah?"

"Why aren't you saying anything?"

"What should I say?"

"I don't know. You just seem… You don't seem angry."

"You want me to be angry?" he asked, slightly amused.

"I'm just saying that that would be the appropriate response to us being split up." She stopped walking. "But you're being calm. It's almost as if you don't care."

Booth turned to face her. "Don't _care?_" He snorted. "Bones, just because I'm not raging and pulling my hair out doesn't mean that I don't care!"

"Well what do you expect me to think? You're the one who always encourages me to talk about my feelings, but now you're hiding yours!"

They were receiving both annoyed and amused glances from passers-by for their yelling, but they didn't notice. Instead they just stared each other in the eye challengingly. Booth was the one to break the eye-contact after a few seconds, out of pure exhaustion.

"Bones, you know I care." He paused and ran his hand through his hair. "But let's not talk about this here. Let's just walk quietly until we find some place to have coffee." With that he turned around and continued walking.

"Why?"

"Just because." He didn't think for a second that she would accept his answer, but he was pleasantly surprised. She hurried after him to walk alongside him.

As they were walking, Brennan kept stealing glances at her partner. Well, former partner. She couldn't understand why he was acting the way he was, in such a distant manner. She had though he would be livid, using every trick in the book so that they could stay together. Was he actually content with the situation? Was he glad that he didn't have to worry about her going to the field anymore? These unpleasant thoughts started slowly but surely to invade her head.

Booth noticed every time when Brennan glanced at his direction. He didn't know if she was doing it out of concern or to figure out what he was thinking. He knew she was confused, and to be honest, so was he. He was trying to organize the thoughts in his head, knowing that he would have to have an honest conversation with her sooner or later. He preferred sooner. Suddenly he felt a light tap on his shoulder. He looked up and saw Brennan pointing at something. He followed the line of her finger and saw the very much familiar diner across the street. Out of silent agreement they made their way over there.

Once they were seated and sipping their coffee, she broke the silence.

"Am I allowed to talk now?"

Booth gave a small laugh. "Yes, Bones."

She mirrored his smile but it soon faded away. She had to ask the question that had been tormenting her.

"Are you happy to get rid of me?"

Booth nearly dropped his coffee cup. "What?"

"Are you glad that I'm not coming with you to the field anymore?"

"You think that I am?"

"You seem to be."

"Wow. You really do suck at reading people," he joked. He knew that he shouldn't be laughing right now, but he couldn't help it. This woman could be so clueless, no matter how smart she was.

Brennan watched the man laughing in front of her and concluded he had finally lost his mind. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't understand what was going on. She had posed a genuine question and now she was being laughed at?

"Why is this funny?" she asked in a slightly whiny voice.

Booth's laughter finally subsided and he took a deep breath. "It's not, really." His eyes still sparkled from the laughing. When he saw the confused look on her face, he straightened up and leaned back on his chair. Brennan could tell from the rigid position that he was finally going to share his thoughts with her. She looked at him intently.

"Bones, this separation thing… It's… It just sucks. We had a good thing going, you know." He started fiddling with his napkin, never taking his eyes off of it. "With your help I could do my job better. You've seen the cases we've had. I could've never solved them without you and the team. Despite being one of the best agents in the Bureau." Brennan rolled her eyes amusedly. He finally looked up from the napkin and leaned forward. "Plus," he continued, "you've made my life much more fun."

Her cheeks were starting to get a pinkish tone. "Hmm. That doesn't sound like me."

"Just believe it, Bones. You're much more fun to hang out with than you give yourself credit for."

Their faces had somehow drawn closer to each other, and this didn't go unnoticed by Booth. He slowly leaned back again. Brennan stayed put.

"And to answer your earlier question… No, I am not the least bit glad that you're not coming to the field with me."

Over an hour later they were back at Brennan's door. Even though they had joked and bantered lightly at the diner, somehow the gravity of the situation caught up to them again. Brennan fished her keys out of her pocket but instead of going in, she stood still.

"So… What do we do now?" she asked, looking up from her shoes. Booth understood the meaning behind the question: she wasn't talking about tonight, she was talking about the future. Suddenly there was this weird sadness looming over them. He cleared his throat.

"I know you don't probably agree with me, but I find it best to spend the weekend ignoring what happened today and catch up to reality again on Monday.

"So you're going to pretend that nothing happened?"

"For two days, yes."

She gave a small laugh. "I like the thought of that."

"Wow. You agree with me?"

"Just this once."

They chuckled together. Booth took his hand out of his pocket and pointed to the elevator.

"I'm going to go now." For a second he considered hugging her, but then settled on just touching her shoulder lightly. Brennan felt the warmth of his hand and blurted out what she was thinking before he could leave.

"Why does this feel like we're saying goodbye?"

"We're not," he said reassuringly. With that, he turned and walked to the elevator. When he was about to step in it, he glanced back at Brennan. "See you tomorrow?"

She smiled and nodded. "See you tomorrow."


	3. Chapter 3

**Okay, here's the third and final chapter of this story. Before you decide to send assassins after me, please read the chapter and the explanation at the end. Again, thank you to all of you who reviewed, I appreciate it VERY much!**

It was Monday evening. Brennan was walking toward the elevator, clipping the visitor's pass on her jacket. She strode with purposeful steps and with a determined look on her face. She got into the elevator and ascended to the sixth floor, where she walked down the hall directly to Booth's office.

Booth was filling out paperwork in a practiced manner. He had been doing this for three hours already, and his eyes were beginning to get strained. When he was finished with yet another file, he dropped the pen unceremoniously on the table and rubbed his hand over his face. He was pondering if he should leave the paperwork for tomorrow and go home or do the tedious work now so that it would be easier tomorrow. While he was thinking it through, in stormed an agitated forensic anthropologist. She stopped in front of his desk and crossed her arms over her chest.

"I refuse to do this."

"Uh, Bones, I'm kinda out of the loop here. What are you talking about?"

"I object to this termination of our partnership."

Booth sighed tiredly. "Yes, I know, but there's nothing we can do. The decision came from a higher level." He looked up at the defiant look on her face. "What got you so worked up again?"

"I've been working at the lab for," she checked her watch, "ten and a half hours without going out _once_! I spent the whole time on the platform examining the remains that the FBI sent us. Apparently I'm still obliged to cooperate with the Bureau, even though I'm not allowed to go to the field. So there I was, _waiting_ for the body to be delivered and with nothing else to do. Normally the two of us could've gone to talk to witnesses or suspects while the body was being transferred. Now I'm basically just a lapdog for these people. I resent that, vehemently!" She let out a puff of air after she had finished her exasperated rant.

After processing everything she had said, Booth got out of his chair and approached her slowly, like one would approach a wild animal. "Okay, Bones, you need to simmer down." He guided her to sit down on one of the two chairs that were in front of his desk. "So you're saying that you got tired of staying at the lab," he translated, leaning on the edge of his desk.

"No, I wouldn't say that, I just-"

"That's almost exactly what you said," he interrupted.

Brennan opened her mouth and closed it again when she couldn't find the right words to say. After a second she recovered.

"What I meant was that we had a routine. A routine that worked. And now that the situation has changed, it's hard to get back on track. Am I being comprehensible?"

"Yes," Booth nodded. "But you know, Bones, it'll just take time to get used to things again. It will feel weird in the beginning but we'll come through."

Brennan pursed her lips in a thoughtful manner. "Was it weird for you? Today, I mean?"

Booth gave a small laugh. "You have no idea how weird it was when you weren't in the car with me, sharing your anthropological views. Pissing me off."

She fought back a chuckle, finally relaxing in her chair a bit. "So that was my only function? To make you agitated?"

"It certainly felt like it, for the most part," he grinned.

They both got lost in their own thoughts that came with all the friendly reminiscing. Booth saw the faraway look on her face and decided to break the silence.

"So, you missed me today, huh?" he asked smugly.

She looked up at him, with a slight smile on her face. "Yes," she answered truthfully.

He was caught off guard by the tenderness he saw in her eyes. They held eye contact until she broke it a few seconds later, looking down at her lap. She cleared her throat.

"I believe I have distracted you from your work enough already, so… I think I'll go home." She stood up and when she was about to turn, he stepped forward.

"Actually," he blurted out, "I was just about to leave. I don't think my brain is functioning at its best right now. And I'm hungry."

She laughed. "Well, that's not at all surprising."

"Hey, I haven't eaten in," he glanced at the clock, "three hours. Wait, that can't be right."

"Booth, you should really try to expand the time between your meals. It's not good for your teeth to eat snacks every couple of hours," she said in her no-nonsense, lecturer-like tone.

"Yeah, thanks for the tip. Want to go to the diner?" he asked while he grabbed his jacket, confident that she would say yes. And that she did.

He turned off the desk lamp and walked out of the office behind her, resting his hands on her shoulders for a while. Somehow they both got a warm feeling in their stomachs, knowing that even though they were no longer working together, they wouldn't lose touch with each other. They were still partners. And that plastered permanent smiles on their faces.

**Still here? :) Good. The purpose of this story was to explore the emotions of Booth and Brennan right after they got split up. That's why the story was just three chapters long. But, I'm working on a sequel where something actually happens between B/B, so if anyone's interested, please let me know!**


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